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<title>you dream of some epiphany (to make sense of what you've seen) by coffeecatsme</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25676140">you dream of some epiphany (to make sense of what you've seen)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeecatsme/pseuds/coffeecatsme'>coffeecatsme</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>AND am planning a second chapter because i didn't have the space to write everything i wanted to, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Being Lost, Canon Fix-It, Crying, Emotional Baggage, Forgiveness, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Breakdown, Post Battle of Hogwarts, Severus Snape Lives, also i wrote like about a thousand words more than i intended, no one can convince me that Severus Snape didn't survive Battle of Hogwarts, prepare your tissues, so i might continue, this is gonna be an emotional ride, you can take Snape lives AUs out of my cold dead hands</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 10:23:06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,706</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25676140</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeecatsme/pseuds/coffeecatsme</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i> ...if Harry had followed the instructions he left him, if the boy did sacrifice himself to the Dark Lord, that the last person who could know his true allegiance would be dead. He would be welcomed as an enemy, a Death Eater, and not… </i>
</p><p>Or, Severus Snape survives Nagini's attack and returns to Hogwarts after the end of the war, broken and hopeless.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Harry Potter &amp; Severus Snape</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>49</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>you dream of some epiphany (to make sense of what you've seen)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>so, this idea had been circling in my head for a while, inspired by this post on Tumblr: https://kalkar0s.tumblr.com/post/624913319905640449/i-have-such-an-urge-to-write-a-lil-fic-about-how</p><p>i just couldn't get this one image out of my head (i'll let you guess which part of the story it comes from) and i HAD TO put it in words. but of course, because it is me, i ended up making it longer and more convoluted than planned, and i'm possibly gonna be adding another chapter. maybe two. who knows. </p><p>anyway, hope you like this!</p><p>p.s. title is from Taylor Swift' epiphany. if y'all haven't listened to folklore yet, first of all, WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE? second of all, go listen to it. i think it might be her best one yet.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When Severus Snape finally gathered enough strength to make his way back to Hogwarts, the fight was over. He lay in the Shrieking Shack for what felt like days, weeks, years, an empty vial that once carried the antidote to Nagini’s bite resting right next to his leg. He never intended to use the antidote on himself—he kept it for others, Hogwarts students and their families, Order members, <em>real </em>heroes that might end up in the snake’s clutches. Still, now, he had more of the antidote resting inside his robes, never used, never even touched after he gathered them, a failsafe that he never got to utilize.</p><p>He was sure Harry Potter didn’t see him use it. Harry left the shack with his final message, given through his memories, convinced that Severus was dead. Once Harry departed, Severus would’ve welcomed death—he’d completed the final mission Dumbledore gave him. Harry was aware of what he needed to do to defeat the Dark Lord, even if it meant his death. His life’s purpose was, finally, actualized. He didn’t have anything else to live for.</p><p>However, life was cruel and didn’t give him his last wish. He woke up later, found himself enveloped in the complete silence of the Shack. The wound on his neck stopped bleeding, yet the utter exhaustion he felt in his entire body suggested that a significant amount of his blood was spilled before the antidote worked its magic.</p><p>Later, he wouldn’t remember how exactly he made the trek back to Hogwarts. The very real pain—physical or not, it did not matter—he felt in his chest indicated that he was very much alive, yet he still felt like he had one foot in the afterlife. One hand still clasped over the wound on his neck as he trekked back through the tunnel, climbed out of the opening right underside of the Whomping Willow, walked up to the entrance hall. Finally, he was able to hear noises coming from the Great Hall. It did not sound like a battle.</p><p>It sounded like a somber celebration. Laughs mixed with cries, happy screams undercut with gut-wrenching wails… He made his way through the corridors of the very familiar castle, carefully keeping his eyes away from the bodies that dotted the ground—all the people he failed to protect, failed to save—and walked up to the Great Hall.</p><p>Through the daze of it all, the ever-present logical part of his brain reminded him that if Harry had followed the instructions he left him, if the boy did sacrifice himself to the Dark Lord, that the last person who could know his true allegiance would be dead. He would be welcomed as an enemy, a Death Eater, and not…</p><p>The word that came to mind didn’t feel right to him. He was a spy. A double agent. He had been a Death Eater and killed people for the Dark Lord. He had been a spy and hurt people for Dumbledore. He had played his part too well that he was always knee deep in Dark Arts. No, Severus Snape wasn’t a hero. He was a tool, a pawn, in Dumbledore’s game against…Voldemort. Anything else that might’ve been in him shattered the night Lily died to protect her son. Now that Harry was also gone, Severus Snape had nothing else to live for.</p><p>Yet he was alive. He was moving through the castle, the sounds from the Great Hall getting closer and closer—who had died, how many, how old were they—feeling like he was walking to his doom. Would he be sent to Azkaban when he returned? Would he be given to the Dementors?</p><p>Would he fight the charges—try to prove that he was never loyal to Voldemort?</p><p>He knew the answer.</p><p>He turned the last corner and finally, the Great Hall was in sight. The doors were open, revealing a celebration, people mingling together and chatting away, laughing, crying, hugging… Dead bodies lay on the ground, families gathered around several of them, mothers crying over their children, boys and girls mourning the death of their parents… Severus looked for familiar faces and spotted a red hair not far from the entrance—which of the Weasleys had succumbed to the Death Eaters? It must be one of the boys. Despite the hatred and insults he threw at them at Hogwarts, Severus’s heart ached for the family. Their boys were too young, too innocent…</p><p>He recognized a few of his other students, some just too young to bear. Yet he couldn’t see the one face he was looking for. Did they put him somewhere else? Surely they would honor the Boy Who Lived for everything he did to finish Voldemort?</p><p>Severus barely made it to the doors of the Great Hall once his knees gave out and hit the ground. His hair fell down to his face like a black curtain, obscuring his vision. He couldn’t lift a hand to push them away but he looked at the bodies again, at the center of the hall to see if anyone was laid down there, looking for the messy jet-black hair and lightning-bolt scar…</p><p>“Professor Snape?” A gasp close to him took his attention away from the bodies. It was Neville Longbottom, looking down at him with shock apparent on his face. He was seated next to a few other Gryffindors, all members of Dumbledore’s Army if Severus remembered correctly, a welcome bane in his existence in his one year as the headmaster.</p><p>Neville’s gasp wasn’t loud enough to get the attention of more than a few people around him, but once those few people recognized the man kneeling at the entrance of the Great Hall and began whispering his name, all the noise in the Great Hall slowly dissipated, leaving its place to shocked exclamations, mumbles colored with disbelief, and footsteps. Soon enough, several people surrounded him. Severus immediately recognized some of the Order members—Kingsley Shacklebolt, Arthur and Bill Weasley—and Hogwarts students—Neville Longbottom, Luna Lovegood, as well as a few other seventh-years.</p><p>He was sure all of them would’ve had their wands pointed at him, pointing it to the Death Eater who betrayed all of them and turned Hogwarts into hell for a year, yet not one of them had a wand in their hand as they stared at him, wide-eyed. He coughed out a bit of blood before he found his voice.</p><p>“I’m…sorry.”</p><p>He didn’t know what exactly he was apologizing for; the list certainly was long. Yet even to get the words out there—words he never thought he would have the chance to say—was enough. His eyes turned to the ground and his shoulders fell under the weight of his resignation. Any time now, he expected someone to pull out a wand and end him… It would be a welcome death…</p><p>“LET ME PASS!” A voice boomed in the Great Hall, a voice so familiar and yet impossible… Severus lifted his head at once, hair falling back, watching as the crowd parted to give space to the wizard confidently making his way to him. His jet-black hair fell on his forehead in messy knots, curling around the top of his round glasses and obscuring the lightning bolt scar Severus knew was there. His green eyes, even at a distance, shone with determination. He commanded respect from the entire Hall, as the gratitude and admiration was written on everyone’s faces as he passed. Severus thought that no one else would be able to part the jubilant and curious crowd except…</p><p>The Boy Who Lived. Harry Potter.</p><p>Harry rushed next to Severus, pushing away Kingsley and Arthur on the way and knelt down in front of the man. Severus had to blink several times to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. Harry Potter—alive. The Boy Who Lived, the boy who carried a part of Voldemort inside him, the boy who had to die so that the Dark Lord could be killed was here and breathing, kneeling across from Severus, his eyes shining with the ghosts of his past but also the promise of the future.</p><p>Dumbledore had told Severus that there was no way. The boy had to die. And yet… And yet…</p><p>“Severus?” Harry choked out and raised his hand to push Severus’s hair away from his face—a gesture Severus never expected from Harry. The boy’s touch was soft on his skin, albeit a bit cold, as he moved his fingers down to his neck, to where Severus’s hand covered Nagini’s bite. Harry gently moved away Severus’s hand and inspected the wound before calling behind him, still keeping his eyes on Severus. “Someone get Madam Pomfrey here.” For a second, no one moved. This time, Harry actually turned back. “NOW!” he roared and the people finally went into action, a couple of them rushing out to go to the infirmary, Severus assumed.</p><p>Harry’s eyes found his again and a lopsided grin appeared on his face. The resemblance to his father, James Potter, was palpable to Severus but for once, looking at Harry, James wasn’t the first person he saw. It was Lily—a younger Lily, perhaps before they even started Hogwarts, turning flowers into butterflies with a similar smile on her face and the same spark in her eyes. “I would’ve called her sooner, but I wanted to make sure you weren’t a ghost,” Harry joked. “It would be just like you to come back like that just to have the last laugh against Voldemort.”</p><p>It was a lighthearted joke, and surely Harry meant it as one, but Severus didn’t miss the tears that filled the boy’s eyes. The crowd around the two of them significantly grew in the last few seconds with no less than thirty people watching the two man silently. Not one of them had their wand raised, not one of them had animosity in their eyes—just the opposite, several of the faces were filled with gratitude and disbelief, smiles and tears, and respect.</p><p>Where Severus expected hate, he found a crowd of people filled with more respect than anyone had ever shown him. He could tell, by their gazes, that they didn’t see Severus Snape, the Death Eater. They saw someone else entirely, something that Severus never even hoped to be.</p><p>Yet his eyes weren’t on the crowd anyway. Severus only had eyes for Harry, whose tears were now streaming down his cheeks, who was surrounded by a smaller group of people all in support of him—Ginny Weasley’s hand on his shoulder, Ron Weasley’s leg pressed against his side, Hermione Granger kneeling down with him to look at Severus…</p><p>“If I’d known…” Harry continued, his voice tear-strained and hoarse now. “I wouldn’t have left you in the Shack. I would’ve tried…” The boy choked up and had to stop, yet Severus knew what he was trying to say. Even now, Harry felt guilty for leaving someone behind, even though at the time he fully believed Severus was a Death Eater.</p><p>In any other situation, Severus would’ve laughed at the sheer obscurity of Harry’s apology. If his mind wasn’t preoccupied by the notion that Harry, somehow, had survived, unless…</p><p>“Is Voldemort…” he breathed out, searching Harry’s eyes. Harry’s shoulders relaxed when he heard him talk, and Severus was pretty sure Ron murmured to Hermione something along the lines of how he’d thought the snake left him mute or something. Harry’s smile widened and he nodded.</p><p>“He’s dead, sir. For real this time,” Harry confirmed, joy and relief palpable in his voice. For once, he didn’t call Severus <em>sir </em>in a snarky or sarcastic way. In fact, anyone would be able to feel the respect that fueled the word. “Thanks to you,” he added as an afterthought. Just hours ago, Severus would’ve rejected the implications of that word. Would’ve ignored how everyone seemed to agree, even the students who hated him all throughout his career at Hogwarts and adults who fully believed him to be a Death Eater.</p><p>Just hours ago, he wouldn’t have accepted Harry’s gratitude. If Harry had been dead, just like he had suspected…</p><p>“How are you…alive?” Severus’s voice was hoarse and shaky, yet understanding filled Harry’s eyes. He must’ve seen the memories in the Pensieve, then. He must’ve known…</p><p>Harry just shrugged, a small smile finding its way to his face. “Love,” he offered simply and it explained absolutely nothing but somehow, at that moment, it was enough for Severus. He gazed into Harry’s eyes—Lily’s eyes—and realization hit him.</p><p>The war was over. Voldemort was dead, and Harry had survived it. He defied the Prophecy, defied what Dumbledore claimed, and survived what should’ve been a death sentence in the hands of Voldemort—twice. There was no soul of Voldemort left alive anywhere; Harry would’ve made sure of that, Severus thought. The last mission Dumbledore ever left him was over, the last piece that tethered Severus to life…</p><p>His own eyes filled with tears as he stared at Harry. The boy frowned, his eyes flickering to Severus’s wound again as if he was looking for more bleeding. “Are you hurt, sir?” he asked quickly. “Madam Pomfrey should be here now, just hang on a little bit more—”</p><p>But his physical health was the last thing on Severus’s mind. Mentally, he was in shambles. Broken, purposeless, hollow—he might as well have been dead. Voldemort was gone, and with him took the only thing that kept Severus going. Took away his purpose and his will to live. Harry might’ve thought he was a hero, or everyone in the Great Hall might’ve been relieved that he was alive, but it meant nothing to him. He wasn’t alive, not really. He died with Lily sixteen years ago and survived only as a pawn with a mission for the rest of his life. Without it, he was merely a piece left alone in a chess board, with no king to protect and no purpose to hide behind.</p><p>A choked sob left his lips. Tears escaped from his eyes and streamed down his cheeks, caught by Harry after a few seconds before they could fall to his robes. “Sir, it’s okay, you survived,” the kid muttered, obviously at a loss of what to do as his hands grasped Severus’s shoulders. “You’re alive, Voldemort’s gone, you have nothing to fear now…” The boy didn’t understand why he was crying. Didn’t understand that Voldemort’s death carved out the last bit of soul Severus had inside, leaving behind a hollow chest and a dead heart.</p><p>Severus Snape never saw a future for himself in which he was happy and content with his life. He never saw a future other than Death Eaters and Dumbledore, other than his missions as a spy, other than keeping Harry safe and alive. Now, his future was just a black canvas and he didn’t know how to fill it. He didn’t know if he even had enough of himself alive to build a future.</p><p>Finally, Harry’s arms circled Severus’s shoulders and pulled him into a tight hug—possibly the first hug he’d had since he left Hogwarts as a student. First real hug at least, a loving and caring one, as selfless as it could get. For his age, Severus looked old, but no one looking at him would be able to tell that he was in his late thirties. In Harry’s arms, he just looked like a broken boy who lost his way, pulled along the road by adults who expected too much of him, carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders from such a young age.</p><p>Severus’s eyes were closed behind his tears, his face pressed on Harry’s shoulders, so he missed the scene that developed around the pair. He wouldn’t believe it when people told him about it afterwards: People of all ages, students and adults alike, even Hogwarts faculty and Order members kneeling around Severus Snape and Harry Potter embracing each other, paying respect to the pair that saved them from the darkest wizard of their age and brought light to their life, even if theirs were snuffed out in the process.</p>
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